


Bring Your Tribble to the Bridge Day

by DestielsDestiny



Category: Star Trek, Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: Angst and Humor, Christmas Fluff, Christmas fic, Crew as Family, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Family Fluff, Fluff and Humor, Friendship, Gen, Post-Star Trek: Into Darkness, Tooth-Rotting Fluff, Tribbles (Star Trek), Triumvirate
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-26
Updated: 2017-12-26
Packaged: 2019-02-20 16:46:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,576
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13150800
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DestielsDestiny/pseuds/DestielsDestiny
Summary: In the twenty-third century, spray paint and glitter are still things. Unfortunately, so are tribbles.





	Bring Your Tribble to the Bridge Day

Bbbrrrrr. 

Jim froze, his head slowly raising to find his first officer’s gaze. Spock was an expert on unexplained phenomenon. And that sound, persistent as it had been for the last half hour, was certainly unexplained. 

Awrrr. 

Spock slanted an elegant eyebrow, conveying what Bones referred to somewhat fondly as “the Vulcan version of incredulous surprise.” Jim suspected Bones had a flow chart or three somewhere on the topic. 

Bbbrrrarrr. 

Jim glanced suspiciously at Bones, who was leaning casually against Spock’s console. His two blue clad best friends had been conspicuously less antagonistic towards each other since his rather inglorious return from the dead. If he didn’t know better, Jim would even venture to call their interactions somewhat…chummy.

Snorting at the mental image of the no doubt truly spectacular eyebrow raise such a phrase would engender from his first officer, Jim swivelled his chair around and prepared to address the other two thirds of Starfleet’s Genius Triumvirate. And yes, the Admiralty really did call them that. Nyota had the communiques to prove it. 

He drew in a breath and-Bbbrrrrr.

Jim’s eyes snapped to Bones’ uniform shirt. The doctor’s hands were balancing casually against Spock’s console, the Vulcan’s eyebrows noticeably flat and circumspect. None of this served to allay his suspicions in the slightest. 

Uurrrr. It was noticeably quieter, but that definitely sounded like…

Jim pushed away from the command chair with a bounce, pausing upon reaching standing and revelling in the ability to actually bounce, without immediately following it up with fainting into Bones’ helpfully waiting arms. 

It had happened often enough that Jim couldn’t find a single of spark worth of resentment in his breast at Bones’ distinctly tense posture when he arrived at Spock’s other shoulder. Spock’s spine was equally stiff, and Jim almost felt inclined to congratulate them both on their admirable restraint. 

“Bones-” Bbbrrrwwrr. 

Jim was forced to blink twice, but yes, Spock’s uniform tunic did indeed appear to be twitching. 

“Bones.” Poker faces abounded. “Yeah Jim?” Unfortunately for his officers, Jim had played a lot of poker with them. 

“What was that?” Unfortunately for Jim, Spock usually won. Shoulders straight, spine firm, Spock could never be called bulky by any means, but his almost emaciated frame managed to almost completely cover Bones, sparing the doctor from displaying his slightly less impressive poker face. Bones rarely won at poker. 

“To what precisely are you referring Captain?” 

Rrrarrr. Jim arched an eyebrow, daring Spock to put his expression to shame. The Vulcan’s shoulder now appeared to be vibrating. 

Bones was no better at subtlety than he was at poker, nearly flattening Spock in his eagerness to exchange places once again. “What’s what Jim?” 

Brrrrar. This time, the sound came from Bones’ pocket. Jim flitted his gaze from the pocket to Bones to Spock’s quivering shoulder and back. 

Crrraarr. Jim whirled around, his gaze narrowing on the Communications station. 

“Lieutenant Uhura!” To her credit, Nyota managed to be the picture of innocence, despite the fact both her shoulders appeared to be vibrating. 

“Yes Captain?” Jim narrowed his eyes. He never had managed to win a poker game when both Spock and Nyota were playing. 

“What exactly is that on your shoulders?” She actually managed to look genuinely irked. “It’s called a uniform Captain.” 

There was real reproach in that expression, and Jim mentally rearranged that memo to the Admiralty on the impracticality of female personnel’s uniforms further up the send list. It was an admittedly very good, and long, long overdue, point. 

Jim blinked, flashing Uhura a rueful look. “Nicely deflect Luite-” Aaarrwrr. 

Whiplash inducing head spin later, Jim’s eyes snapped to Sulu’s consul, which seemed to be trilling faintly. That did it. 

“What the hell is going on here-” 

“Captin’!” Scotty rarely did anything calmly, but even for him, this particular slide out of the elevator was singularly impressive. That he managed it without crashing right into the viewscreen, that is. 

Jim found a grin playing across his face of its own accord. Scotty could always be counted on to make things make sense these days-“ 

AAAARRRRR. CCRRRWWWR. BBRRWWRR. 

Jim just restrained the urge to clap his hands to his ears against the sheer pitch of the screaming emanating from the engineer’s general vicinity. 

“Mr. Scott!” Jim had to shout to be heard. Not so much over the as yet still unidentified noises, as the frantic interventions of his crew attempting to shoosh the guileless Scotsman. 

Scotty was a terrible poker player. Even more terrible than Jim. 

“Aye Captain?” Jim wondered vaguely if something important might have actually brought his Chief Engineer to the Bridge in the first place, then dismissed the thought as immaterial in the present moment. If the Ship was in danger of blowing up, Scotty would have commed ahead.

“What is that??!” Scotty appeared not to mind the volume, roaring gamely back. Naturally, the rest of the Bridge was oddly silent at this point, apart from trilling purrs jumping back and forth behind Jim’s back. 

“What is what Captin?” Jim considered briefly that Scotty might have been taking lessons from Spock, then dismissed the thought and glared instead. “That noise Mr. Scott.” 

His voice sounded oddly quiet in the sudden cessation of purring. 

Scotty looked mortally offended. “Jim!” His own volume had not lowered a single jot. “Didnae call it noise! You’ll offend the wee lads.” Jim felt his eyebrows shoot even higher on his forehead. 

“What?” Scotty reached a hand into his thrumming shirtfront, pulling forth something furry and green and-

“Spock.” Jim wasn’t the least surprised when his first officer materialized at his elbow. “Yes Captain?” 

“Is that what I think it is?” Spock had the nerve to arch an elegant eyebrow. “I believe it is a Tribble Captain.” Jim was never playing poker with any of them again. 

“Mr. Spock?” Voice as even as ever, eyebrow not even twitching, the predictable “Yes Captain?” came again. Jim prayed for patience, and wondered when he started to feel this old. 

“Correct me if I’m wrong, but Tribbles are not allowed on Federation vessels, are they not?” 

Spock hesitated. It was just for a moment, but Jim caught it. Course, Bones materializing at Spock’s own elbow was a helpful hint. Bones did that a lot these days, when this topic came up. 

“Normally that is correct Captain, but there were…extenuating circumstances.” Jim felt his eyes prickle slightly. Extenuating circumstances. Yeah, that about covered it. 

Jim carefully did not look at Bones. He could never quite bring himself to, where is death was concerned. It hurt too much, to see how much it had hurt the people he cared about. And as always, Bones topped that list. 

Jim swung back to Scotty, confusion firmly slammed down over his face. “Since when do tribbles come in green…” Jim risked a glance at the thing and just managed not to gape “…is that glitter?”

The diversion worked, the Scotsman gamely warming to his topic. “Nay Captin, the wee little ones love the stuff!” Jim couldn’t help himself, “But…green?” 

Scotty grinned harder. “Aye Captain, it’s Christmas!” Jim mentally called up a calendar and ticked off the days. Twenty, twenty-one, twenty-two, twenty-three…

Jim whirled around. “Bones, when were you planning to remind me it was almost Christmas Eve-“ Jim cut himself off, the sight before him making his jaw drop slightly. 

The purring had started up again, now amplified by the lack of clothing shielding the little furry bodies perched about each of the Bridge Crew. That, in itself, was odd enough, but it was the colours that got Jim. 

Every tribble was decked out in some outlandish colour, reds and blues and silvers and golds. Glitter seemed to cover every available surface they touched, and was that tinsel? 

Bones materialized yet again beside Jim, who was forced to admit that that fact he’d somehow managed to miss Tribbles covered in glitter and spray paint invading his Bridge while he was on it probably had more to do with his still frequent lapses in attention than the distinct possibility that Spock had managed to invent and install personalized clocking devices during their six month’s rebuild. 

“You alright Jim?” That voice was as soft and cracked as it had been the day they met, and Jim felt his eyes begin to prick for quite another reason. 

Spock was just beyond Bones’ shoulder now, and Jim blinked rapidly. A tug at his sleeve, accompanied as it was by a shrill purr, was hardly a surprise, but Jim blinked twice at the sight of Keenser proffering a tribble towards him. The junior engineer’s shoulders were adorned with more of the trilling balls of fur, so Jim carefully scoped up the one being offered to him. 

If playing poker with Spock had taught him anything, it was when to fold. 

The tribble, which appeared to be adorned with silver and gold candy cane patterns, purred happily against his skin, and Jim felt his heartbeat drop accordingly. 

“Jim?” It was Spock’s voice this time, soft and barely audible over the positively vibrating air of the Bridge. Jim found the cacophony oddly soothing. 

“I’m fine gentlemen” Jim met Bones’ eyes, the trilling ball dripping red glitter down his best friend’s collar making it impossible to keep a straight face. 

“I’m good Bones.” And for the first time since waking up in a world that no longer had a Christopher Pike it in, he really meant it too.


End file.
